Mobile devices have long had the ability to track their own location relative to the surface of the Earth through receipt and analysis of wireless signals from multiple global positioning system (GPS) or global navigation satellite system (GNSS) satellites. Thus, users of such computing devices, whether carried on their persons or installed within vehicles, have long been able to view a visual presentation of where they are on the surface of the Earth at any given moment. Further, beyond simply presenting location information such as a current set of coordinates, mobile devices have long incorporated location applications to make use of such location information in providing other services (e.g., presenting weather predictions for a current location; presenting locations of shops or gas stations, along with their prices, etc., near a current position; etc.).
More recently, mobile devices have been provided the ability to track their own location relative to an interior of a venue (e.g., an interior of a mall, a store, an airport terminal, etc.) with a finer location accuracy level than possible using signals emanating from satellites, which may also not be able to penetrate portions of such structures to reach their interiors. This is typically done by receiving and analyzing wireless signals emanating from wireless network access points (APs) forming a location network within such a venue, sometimes based on hyperbolic navigation principles. Further, such mobile devices have recently come to incorporate location applications to cooperate with location services provided by such a location network to guide users to locations of particular items of interest within a venue, such as products available for purchase, new products and/or products for which promotions are offered within that venue. Such location applications rely on a location provider of a mobile device that has been configured to interact with such location network providing such location services within a venue to determine a current location of the mobile device relative to rooms, hallways, aisles, shelves, kiosks, information desks, restrooms, etc. The location provider then provides the current location to a location application associated with the venue and able to correlate items of interest to the locations at which those items of interest are offered within that venue. Such correlations are then used to guide a user to items of interest and/or to present promotions (e.g., discounts) associated with those items.
Unfortunately, typical system architectures within such mobile devices have been found to enable a form of “hijacking” of such location information by other location applications that may use such location information to present users with competing information intended to encourage users to leave that venue for a competing venue. More specifically, location information indicating a current location within one venue may be used by a location application of a competing venue to present a user with ads concerning competing products or services offered at the competing venue (sometimes referred to as a “showroom pushing threat”).
In such architectures, location information from any location provider of a mobile device is typically freely distributed by a location manager of the mobile device to any location application requesting it from the location manager. The location manager is typically interposed between the location providers and the location applications to provide a platform-agnostic interface for the location applications. Though such free flowing provision of location information by the location manager was originally envisioned as being a benefit, in these situations, it has proven to enable malicious behavior by one location application against another. Further, the fact of the location manager typically being a component of an operating system (OS) of a mobile device has been known to render the location manager vulnerable to being corrupted to enable hijacking.